xcviii President's Address 



cent extent and general excellence, and which, from 

 the largeness of the annual grants it has for many 

 years received from Parliament, is one of the most astonish- 

 ing proofs of the profuse liberality of the country wherever 

 the diffusion of knowledge is to be promoted. 



In conclusion, gentlemen, I haA T e but one circumstance to 

 regret, namely, the non-publication of our Transactions 

 owing to the rather sudden withdrawal of State-aid ; but 

 the Council have now determined to resume the publication, 

 although it will under the circumstances be necessary to 

 make some selection and condensation of the papers to be 

 published, and give abstracts, as is done by so many societies 

 at home, of the others. This publication is absolutely 

 necessary to keep faith with the very large number of 

 scientific societies in every part of the world who now send 

 us tjieir Transactions, and expect to receive ours in exchange ; 

 and although a considerable increase in the number of 

 members of the Society is very greatly desired to enable 

 the publication to take a form worthy of the Society and 

 the country, without asking aid from the Government, 

 yet I have no doubt at all of the success of the new 

 endeavours. 



From what I have already said, it will be seen that the 

 people of this country and their representatives in Parlia- 

 ment, and all successive Governments, have been pre-emi- 

 nently distinguished by their zeal for the dissemination of 

 knowledge, and for the success which has already added a 

 different lustre to our " golden " reputation, with which so 

 many and important branches of the different sciences and 

 their applications have been prosecuted here ; and as I have 

 shown that in most of the best of those intellectual successes 

 which raise the colony so much in the estimation of think- 

 ing men at home, the Royal Society has played no unim- 



